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All the United States Utah Cisco Home of the Brave

Home of the Brave

Within the former ghost town of Cisco is a carefully restored tiny town with one resident and its own art residency.

Cisco, Utah

Added By
Evan Nicole Brown
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An abandoned school bus under the Cisco sky.   Courtesy of Eileen Muza
Cisco, no longer abandoned.   Larissa Hayden/Used with permission
Cisco’s still operational post office.   Larissa Hayden/Used with permission
A basketball hoop featured by the Utah Jazz in their pre-game video footage.   Larissa Hayden//Used with permission
Enter at your own risk.   Larissa Hayden//Used with permission
  juliettnclx / Atlas Obscura User
Cisco Town Map   jennbrook / Atlas Obscura User
  breaingram / Atlas Obscura User
  breaingram / Atlas Obscura User
Cisco life.   Larissa Hayden//Used with permission
  breaingram / Atlas Obscura User
Rebuilding Cisco.   Courtesy of Eileen Muza
A mountain range mural.   Larissa Hayden//Used with permission
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Visual artist Eileen Muza has lived in the ghost town of Cisco since 2015, and has spent the last four years restoring the town with salvaged materials in hopes of bringing more creatives to the beautiful and abandoned outpost.

In the 1880s, Cisco was an old Western railroad town under the starry Utah sky. The Denver and Rio Grande Western traveled through, and visitors mingled with local ranchers and shepherds in the city’s saloon, restaurants, and hotels. In 1924, oil, turquoise, and natural gas were discovered nearby, which caused the town to grow.

But as freeways and more locomotives began to skirt the tiny Utah town, it became easier and easier to bypass it, rendering it into a ghost town. Stories of murder and mayhem from the town’s history, including shootings at Ethel’s to fugitives passing through to sinister alleged visits from Ted Bundy, certainly didn’t help the town's reputation. Still, after hearing about the place from a seatmate on a flight, Muza left her “normal” Chicago life for permanent residence in the ghost town.

Today, there are approximately 100 abandoned buildings in Cisco, most of which are dilapidated sheds and shacks, and building materials left scattered about. Muza estimates that there are only seven fully intact buildings, one of which is her log cabin, another being Ethel’s Cafe. Two buildings, the log cabin and the post office, are available for overnight guests.

The residency that's set up in the town, "Home of the Brave," invites an artist to set up their studio inside a remodeled 1970s Winnebago Brave camper in the center of town, with windows facing east toward Sal Mountain and west toward the Bookcliffs.

For those who can handle extreme seasonal temperature swings and the imposing presence of desert dust and wind storms, Cisco is an ideal place to escape any kind of comfort zone.

With old oil wells and outhouses as a backdrop, Muza has rebuilt and restored big chunks of what remains of Cisco with her hands, finding strange examples of everyday life in an old desert town along the way, like a television hidden in a late-19th-century dugout, a half-full bottle of maple syrup sitting where a wood-burning stove used to be, an old military jacket stuffed between two walls (with a packet of tobacco in it, stamped 1939).

Related Tags

Ghost Towns Art Places To Stay

Know Before You Go

Cisco is no longer abandoned. Be respectful of the town's restoration efforts and resident by not smashing any structures or trespassing into homes. Those wishing to support the town's restoration efforts can donate here.

Community Contributors

Added By

Evan Nicole Brown

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nicsharper, larissahayden, breaingram, juliettnclx...

  • nicsharper
  • larissahayden
  • breaingram
  • juliettnclx
  • jennbrook

Published

May 6, 2019

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  • https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/art-residency-utah-ghost-town
Home of the Brave
Cisco
Old Cisco Hwy
Cisco, Utah, 84515
United States
38.911433, -109.140438
Visit Website
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Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Utah

Utah

United States

Places 155
Stories 29

Nearby Places

Fisher Towers

Castle Valley, Utah

miles away

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Explore the Destination Guide

Photo of Utah

Utah

United States

Places 155
Stories 29

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